Sirius Black and the Golden Lion

Charming Revenge

But as they walked into the classroom for their charms lesson, Sirius quickly forgot about Remus' running off. The other boy had already found a seat, and kept spaces for him and James. Sirius slid in next to him, and James followed.

"No teacher yet?" James asked, leaning over to ask Remus, who shook his head.

"It's some guy called Flitwick, I believe, but I haven't seen him yet."

Remus was back to his usual colour, and Sirius noticed that he was sounding happier too. He guessed that the other boy must just have been feeling unwell that morning. Sirius could sympathise; he never felt at his best first thing either, but his mother had still always forced him to do the chores.

Sirius' ruminating was cut short when, with a bang, the classroom door flew open again, and Peter fell through.

"I am in the right place?" he asked breathlessly, picking himself up.

"Yes...how on earth did you manage to be so late?" Remus asked. Sirius was puzzled; he had assumed that Peter was tagging along behind him and James.

"It was a poltergeist," Peter grimaced. "I lost sight of Sirius and James, and he tried to drop a vase on my head, then chased me down a corridor."

Sirius snorted at the mental image of Peter being chased by a poltergeist. Next to him, James was having poorly disguised hysterics; Sirius supposed it was about the same thing.

"Will you two please shut up?" Remus asked.

"Ah, loosen up, Remie-boy," Sirius chortled. "There's nothing wrong with a good giggle."

"Mr. Black is quite right." James and Sirius stopped laughing immediately, and looked around for the source of the new voice.

"But perhaps the laughter would be better suited for outside of lessons," the voice continued. It was an odd voice, somewhat squeaky and high pitched, but still obviously male. James was still looking around madly, but Sirius thought that the voice seemed to come from the teacher's desk.

This was confirmed when, as he watched, a small hand appeared on the top of the desk. It was quickly followed by the rest of one of the funniest looking wizards that Sirius had ever seen.

"Good morning, Class!" he squeaked.

Professor Flitwick was a very small man, with a long brown beard and brown hair. Like the Herbology teacher, he seemed to have a permanent smile. Sirius wondered if all the Hogwarts professors were so happy; then he remembered Professor McGonagall and decided that they probably weren't.

Professor Flitwick was standing on his chair, as it was the only way he could see over the desk. All eyes were now on him eagerly. Sirius thought that he was going to like this lesson- charms had always interested him because they could change things in a similar way to jinxes and hexes, but didn't actually hurt anyone.

As the lesson progressed, Sirius decided that his first impressions were right. Charms were every bit as interesting as he had hoped, but he was amazed at the standard of the rest of the class. When Professor Flitwick showed them the Wingardium Leviosa charm, many of the class gasped when he said that he expected them all to be able to do it by Christmas.

Sirius was puzzled. He had taught himself Wingardium Leviosa when he was eight. He knew that most of the muggle born wizards wouldn't know any spells, but many of the pureblood ones were looking as blank and apprehensive.

The rest of the lesson was taken up with notes, and when Sirius finally came to pack his things away, he decided that he would be good at Charms. He felt a lot better then- he had known that he was fairly good at magic, but had expected everyone else to be similar.

As they left the classroom, Sirius couldn't help smiling to himself in satisfaction. Maybe this wasn't going to be so bad after all.

"Can you believe he wants us to levitate things by Christmas?" Peter asked breathlessly, half-running to keep up with James and Sirius, who were both taller and therefore had longer legs Sirius snorted, and looked sideways at James to see his reaction. James merely shrugged.

However, neither of them had chance to give Peter an answer as, at that moment, they rounded a corner and walked straight into Severus Snape. He looked the three boys up and down.

"Having fun?" he sneered.

"Just ignore him," Sirius said, grabbing James and Peter's arms.

"That's right, Black, run away." Sirius looked back and saw Snape smirking at him. "I thought Gryffindors were meant to be brave, but then, you never could fit in, could you?"

"And look who you're calling friends," Snape continued, clearly determined to get a rise out of Sirius. "Muggle-lovers," he looked at James, "And wimps," he turned to Peter.

Sirius let go of the others' arms and started back towards Snape. Next to him, James was matching his pace, clearly fuming. They had nearly reached him when they heard another voice.

"James, Sirius, what are you doing?"

Sirius looked up past Snape and saw Remus approaching them.

"What took you so long?" he asked, momentarily forgetting Snape. Remus shrugged as he passed Snape and came to a halt by

"Had to talk to Professor Flitwick," he said, his face inscrutable. "James, put your wand away." Sirius looked sideways at James, who was lowering his wand reluctantly.

"You didn't hear him," he protested. "He insulted us."

"Then why don't you go crying to your blood-traitor parents," Snape sneered, as he made to leave.

Sirius reached for his own wand, but Remus grabbed his arm. Both James and Sirius cast identical, murderous looks after Snape, who was slouching away down the corridor.

"Ahh, why wouldn't you let me hex him while I had the chance?" James asked Remus disappointedly.

"James, you're a first year wizard. I doubt you could do him any significant harm," Remus replied, starting off down the corridor in the opposite direction to Snape. James followed after him.

"Well then, I bet Sirius could," James said earnestly. Sirius wasn't sure. He was beginning to realise that he really did know far more magic than most of the other first years, but he had never really been interested in learning hexes. He felt that, as a Black, it was the first thing he should have learned, so he immediately chose not to.

Remus looked at Sirius sideways, and raised an eyebrow.

"I dunno," Sirius said. "I guess I probably could, and now I wish I had. That's the second time I've had a run in with him, and it's only the first day."

"Yeah, you have to let Sirius get his revenge," James interrupted eagerly.

"I don't think that's a good idea," Remus started.

"Why?" Sirius and James demanded together.

"Like Sirius said, it's our first day, and I don't reckon that landing in detention for hexing someone on your first day is a good way to start."

"He's right," Sirius said, dejectedly. It was completely against his nature not to want revenge; after all, he had been put through hell as a child, but refused to change his views, he wasn't about to start submitting now.

"You're not just going to let him get away with it?" James asked indignantly.

"We can't do that!" Sirius said, deciding that he didn't care if he landed in detention.

Remus looked at them oddly.

"This is really important to you, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Sirius said quietly. "I'm not used to just giving in."

Remus said nothing more as they walked down to the Great Hall for lunch. As they entered the hall, Sirius heard sniggering from the table on the side of the hall. He deliberately avoided looking at them, guessing that it was probably Bellatrix and her friends.

James' eyes lit up as they sat at the Gryffindor table, which was covered in tureens full of sausages and mashed potato. He grabbed a spoon, and started ladling food onto his plate as if he hadn't eaten for a month. The other three also helped themselves, but much less energetically.

As he ate, Sirius had a feeling that someone was watching him. He looked up from his plate, and caught Remus' eye.

"You alright?" Sirius asked him.

"Yeah..." Remus said.

"But..." Sirius prompted

"Nothing." Remus looked back down at his plate again. Sirius nudged James, who was still eating furiously.

"What?" the other boy asked indistinctly.

"You reckon Remus is ok?" Sirius muttered under his breath.

"What?" James asked again.

"Oh, don't worry," Sirius said.

As they walked out of the hall, they met Snape coming the other way. Remus immediately grabbed James and Sirius and hauled them away, but not before Snape had had chance to snarl "Blood-traitors" audibly in their direction. Remus didn't let go of their arms till they were safely back in their common room.

"Third time today!" Sirius cursed, wrenching his arm out of Remus' grip. James was leaning against the back of an armchair, shaking with rage and looking murderous.

"I'm sorry, Remus, but we can't let him keep doing this."

"You mean, I can't keep dragging you away," Remus corrected him, half raising an eyebrow. "But I still don't think you should hex him."

"What?" James spluttered angrily. "He's insulted us all, and you saw what he did to Sirius this morning."

Sirius subconsciously touched his cheek. Had that really been the same morning? It seemed like an age ago.

"Hexes are too much associated with dark wizards," Remus said. "If you use one, you'll just be stooping to his level."

"What then?" James demanded.

"Think about it. Hexes are spells used to cause harm to someone, and are generally used by dark wizards. What's the light equivalent?"

Both James and Sirius looked blank. Sirius couldn't be bothered with all this fussing; he just wanted to hurt Snape. A quick glance at James told him that he felt the same. But suddenly, something clicked in his brain.

"A charm, I guess," he said out loud. James snorted derisively.

"What are you going to do, tickle him to death or something?"

"No, I don't want you to hurt him at all," Remus said. "But I can't see that embarrassing him a bit will hurt anyone..."

Ten minutes later, the three boys walked into the library.

"I still don't get this, " James said. " One minute we're talking about embarrassing Snape, the next, you're dragging us into the library."

Remus just pushed the other two towards a table and disappeared among the shelves. James sighed impatiently but took a seat. Sirius said nothing. He had never seen a library like this before. Used as he was to the dark and dusty family library, the spacious and bright Hogwarts library was like a breath of fresh air to him. He was still drinking in the atmosphere when Remus appeared, carrying a large textbook.

"Thought they'd have it here," he commented. "My dad has a copy, but I couldn't bring it with me."

He flipped it open and thumbed through it expertly, till it fell open at a page with brightly coloured illustrations. Remus jabbed his finger at the title.

"Continuous Colour Changing," Sirius and James read together. Sirius looked up.

"You want us to turn him orange or something?"

Remus grinned widely.

"That's exactly what I want you to do, but this spell means that you change colour every half an hour for a whole day."

Sirius and James looked at each other and grinned mischievously. If they couldn't physically hurt Severus Snape, humiliating him had to be the next best thing.

"So, is it hard?" Sirius asked.

"I don't think it's too bad...but I don't think you should do it, Sirius."

"Why?" Sirius protested loudly, which earned him a disapproving glare from the librarian.

"Shh," hissed Remus. " Because you're the first one that Snape will suspect."

"Then let me do it!" James said quickly and eagerly. Remus appeared to consider it and nodded his head.

"Sure. I think we should wait till tonight..."

"What?" James and Sirius exclaimed simultaneously.

"Because if you get him just as he's walking into the Great Hall for dinner, the whole school will see him."

James nodded, and Sirius grinned at Remus. For someone who already seemed to be friends with all the teachers, Remus was actually pretty cool.